CloudSIM™ to Catalyze Growing Need for On-demand Connectivity

The eSIM has been around for a while now, and thanks to Apple it is now going mainstream. But when it comes to the IoT domain, there are several bottlenecks with respect to deployment, connectivity and migration. A few months ago, we spoke about SIM shortages and eSIM migration with Olivier Leroux from Oasis Smart-SIM. Now we have Olivier back on the show to discuss a new solution called CloudSIM™.  

CloudSIM™ is a remote hardware SIM which is stored in a dedicated, secure and GSMA-certified environment. It is primarily aimed at use cases that do not require permanent connectivity. CloudSIM™ is scalable, interoperable and easy to deploy. 

In the latest episode of ‘The Counterpoint Podcast’, host Neil Shah is joined by Olivier Leroux, President and Founder of Oasis Smart-SIM, to talk about the new architecture called CloudSIM™. The discussion covers eSIM bottlenecks from the architecture point of view and how CloudSIM™ will meet those challenges, the solution’s use cases, how it complements eSIM, and much more.

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Transcript

Podcast Transcription:  

Neil: [00:00:11] Hello everyone and welcome back to The Counterpoint Podcast. I'm your host Neil Shah, and today we are going to talk about a very innovative technology called CloudSIM™, which will take the eSIM to the next level. 

A few months back, we had an interesting discussion with Olivier Leroux from Oasis Smart Sim, where we talked about how the component shortages and the entire ecosystem has been suffering, especially with the SIM card and eSIM, and how it has accelerated a need for better eSIM connectivity and migration.

So today we have Olivier back on the show. So we are going to talk about how Oasis and Tata Telecommunication are building this new architecture called CloudSIM™ and how it'll help catalyze the eSIM adoption. So without further ado, let me welcome Olivier. 

Bonjour Olivier! How are you? Great to have you here. 

Olivier: [00:01:05] Bonjour Neil, thank you very much for having me back here. It's always a pleasure to have a discussion with you and to talk to your listeners and to try to see what are the fundamental trends of the industry. And yeah, a very different subject for last month's podcast where we were talking about the difficulty of the semiconductor industry.

Here we are going to talk, we are looking to look forward. We are going to see what, what are the future evolution of the industry in something which we think would be a fundamental evolution of the technology in the year to come. 

Neil: [00:01:45] So we have been discussing about eSIM for almost now, six to seven years. It has gotten to mainstream level thanks to Apple, thanks to automotive industry as well, where we have seen a greater adoption of eSIM , right? 

So, but still there are some bottlenecks from architecture point of view, from supply chain point of view, which we discussed last time, and also broader adoption when it comes to M2M or IoT settings, right?

So, can you talk about a little bit of challenges which industry is facing and how we can solve those? 

Olivier: [00:02:20] Okay. So as you said, you know, one of the first challenge the eSIM industry is facing is really the fact that eSIM is not one standard, but two, and in the future are three standard which are working together. And this is a reflection of the reality, you know, and the industry started thinking that the eSIM would be totally dedicated to M2M. And therefore, I mean, and when people think about M2M, they mostly think about automotive. And that was the first standard. Then we, we realized, and it was a pressure from the OEM, that there was a strong demand from the consumer device industry. And because you remember, we discussed about that the, the traction is really coming from the smartphone OEMs and therefore, eSIM standard was borm. And we realized then that there was a, there was a unserved gap in the bid, which was this IoT space, and hence the industry is working on this search standard.

But the reality is we are still learning about those standards and, and the reality is, you know, the M2M . is a good standard for automobile, but maybe a bit too rigid for the industry to vertical to static. The standard for the consumer is fundamentally a replication of the traditional SIM model. It has faced some challenge of adoption by the MNO  but we keep moving, but fundamentally it remain a sim and the IoT is a type of converging model.

So no new evolution and in parallel, the world changed me, the world, the usage change. You know, when we started to define those standard 10 years ago there was hardly one connection point into an automotive. And now we start to see automotive getting into the market with six, seven, eight connection points.

You know, it's not only the car by itself, the dashboard need to be connected. Some other part of the vehicle need to be connected. The passenger want to have their own connectivity. So we have on one side the need to have permanent connectivity anywhere at all the time, and we need to accommodate new usage and fundamentally the three standard which exist in eSIM also part of the need, but not all the needs. And this is why this this innovation that is bring forward by Oasis and Tata communication intent to provide solution to new needs. 

Neil: [00:05:07] So can you give an example on this new innovation, which you guys are working on? A glimpse of it? 

Olivier: [00:05:11] Well, the idea Okay. Is to say, Yes, we can rely on permanent connectivity. And this permanent connectivity is well covered by eSIM let's be, or, or sim. Let's be, let's be clear, you want to connect the device one way permanently, when I call permanently is 24x7 and everything.

You are well served by what existing term of technology, but they are, they are now business case that start to develop into the industry where you need on demand connectivity because you need on demand connectivity because at some point of time you need additional bandwidth. At some point of time, you may want to use a different channel of connectivity for security because the service you want to offer with your connectivity is not a permanent service.

We can take some very simple example. You know, if, if you manage a rental car company, your car are not rented all the time, and the connectivity you want to give to your customer is just during the usage of the car by this customer. So maybe this customer will run the car for one day and maybe this customer will run the car for three hours.

How do you accommodate that? And the answer is not factored into the dc You need to invent different technology, different way to operate the access to the network. And this is what it we intend to do with the CloudSIM™.

Neil: [00:06:38] That's super interesting. So do you say this is a alternative to eSIM or a complimentary technology to it.

Olivier: [00:06:46] It's definitely a compliment. Okay. We are now with this technology and you know, that is this data we are pushing very strong. And toward the eSIM we propose to the market with the Tata move platform, something which is very unique, which is covering all the technology which is very horizontal towards the segment, toward the UEM technology and everything.

So we are a great sponsor promoter of eSIM technology in the market. So the intention with CloudSIM™ technology, we did not discuss it. I assume people understand that fundamentally we want to position the SIM functionality in the cloud and to manage the pairing between the device and the CloudSIM™ into a smart and secure way so that there is a, there is a dynamic of association between the device and the CloudSIM™, which is, which is quite agile, quite attractive, which allow to do cool subscription management, fleet management, many use case that maybe we will discuss after. So, so clearly it complement the action on the scene. We don't intend in any way to replace or to, to say it is better. It offer different use case it different it offer different business model and we try to address to, to answer different question with the CloudSIM™.

Neil: [00:08:11] Correct. No, that's a great example of rental car company and I completely agree . That total cost of ownership. There could be a lot of advantages. Right. Or use cases that you don't have to pay 24x7.

Olivier: [00:08:23] Yeah, exactly. Again, you know, we are not here mentioning the cost of the CloudSIM™ itself. That's not the point. The really point is the point of connectivity. You know, so how you can optimize. Your, your connectivity, which is very often linked to permanency, the number of point of permanent connection and everything. And here you can create a pool effect ratio effect, which will have a deep impact on the improvement of your cost, of deployment, of connectivity, and through the on demand this, this is where you fundamentally change the model. 

Neil: [00:08:58] What other different use case other than that rental company example you gave? Could be like really good. 

Olivier: [00:09:04] Yeah. That's why I don't want to though. We, and we invite your listener to come to the workshop. We are going to do during Mobile World Congress on automotive, where we will discuss over auto use case and automotive.

This is not the only of course the only segment we intend to cover with this technology. Let, let me give you, One or two different examples. You know many people today work from home. They today because we, we are still into a type of post covid type of abnormal situation. Most of them are using their own connectivity to access the company's information system.

Neil, you don't work all the time. B, more and more you will need dedicated connectivity to access the it backend of the. can, can you and this is something we are going to show during this Mobile World Congress, can you connect this CloudSIM™ technology to your PC so that when you start to work, you can access on demand during your working shift mobile connectivity, which provide you a secure economical access and supported by the company access to the IT system of the company. So that's, that's one of the use case, we we intend to cover. 

We, we understand that in many industrial equipment today, you know, the access to the equipment by the equipment manufacturer is not possible through the IT organization of where it is deployed.

Imagine you are, you, you are supplying manufacturing, equipment . Nowhere a company will give you access to its IT infrastructure to, to do the remote support of the equipment. With CloudSIM™, we open the possibility to open, dedicated, secure channel on demand to this equipment so that the remote maintenance can be done.

Okay? So, you know, so in the industrial field, we see some strong application in, even in the enterprise field, we see some very key benefits . That could reflect from the usage of this on demand connectivity solution. 

Neil: [00:11:20] Yeah, absolutely. More I hear about it. I, I can envision different use cases where in fact, many of the use cases in IoT , right, where are, don't require permanent connectivity. They send data in first, right? One time a day or two times. So completely agree with you

Olivier: [00:11:41] Exactly. And again, you know, I think it is difficult or in a podcast like this to give you a, a full perspective on the possibility of the technology. But you know, we can also address use case where the primary access of the device to the network it's not mobile where, you know, you have device which are connected through satellite, through now IoT network and everything. And, and suddenly, Bootstrapping those existing connectivity, you can fire up on demand, a mobile connectivity. Imagine you deployed satellite gateway and from time to time, you know, you, you have your gateway, which is in your, in your company and everything And from time to time, again, for use case, we right earlier because you need additional bandwidth because you, you are requested to use a dedicated VPN to access some system. You are powering on for a period of time. That could be one hour, that could be one day, one week, a CloudSIM™, which will give you to a mobile network and this type of flexibility, open, endless opportunity.

And you know, because we are talking from time to time that we've been announcing, we, we, the first prototype of this technology in October, 2020, we, we, it was really a prototype and since three years, we are working on industrialization, working out the use case and the business case, and at no point into this journey, We have said, no, we, we see some risk with this technology.

We don't believe into the future of this technology. And, you know, it's been review of course internally at Oasis. Then Oasis became part of Tata Communication Group. And, and the energy, the, the feeling that we have something great to play is the same within Oasis with its data. And this will be one of the major innovation and, and because we arrive to the Mobile World Congress with an MVP and something which is ready to be deployed by some real player in the market we, we are seeing the same level of energy and passion toward this CloudSIM™ solution. 

Neil: [00:13:48] That's great. I, I believe this is more of a proprietary technology, and you have property for this, but do you see this also? Becoming more of a standard standardized technology.

Olivier: [00:14:00] I, of course, this is an objective. I understand it'll take passions effort to convene, to convince the ecosystem. I have a fantastic team for that. We, we are pushing, we are starting to get a lobby. It's not mandatory again today the technology is supported at end to end by Tata Communication, hopefully soon by the, the sponsor of Tata Communication. And we will welcome every MNO that want to access this CloudSIM™ technology. 

It's also a technology which is ready to be assembled. It has been designed in a way, tn the same sense of security, it can be assembled to the remote SIM provisioning infrastructure. I mean, again, during the podcast, this is difficult to explain, but we will welcome anybody who want to discuss that during Mobile World Congress of after, and how we can link the cloud team to the RSP infrastructure.

But, but again, it is true that it is our intellectual property. This is a product we are patenting. This is a, an innovation we are bringing to the market. Who is the ambition at some point of time to get it accepted by, by the ecosystem. It, it's not mandatory. It's not a showstopper. It would be something good.

Neil: [00:15:25] I asked that question because I was also thinking about scalability and interoperability of the solution . And I believe since it's cloud-based, it should not be a huge issue. 

Olivier: [00:15:35] No, it's not a huge issue. I mean, the scalability is, is fantastic on this technology. I mean hopefully , you, we, see in the, in the near future how Easy is it is to deploy IoT or, or the use case we mentioned with this technology, the, the scalability. There is no hardware involved. There is no footprint into the device or very little footprint into the device. 

As you say, it's cloud-based or the scalability is it, it's quite important. And again, I think that when, when we get to outside of this, image, which is sometime associated with the cloud, which is the lack of security and everything, which is not, which is not true. And again, we are calling it cloud because the, the, the software is positioned on the cloud, but we position the software into a private cloud, which is GSM certified. So it, it's not open. It's not open cloud and everything. So we, fundamentally respect all the principle of the security for, SIM and for eSIM standard.

So I think that will only take time and that the ecosystem will soon realize that this is something that we can deploy and we can scale . In, in the first manner in the industry. 

Neil: [00:16:58] It's fascinating. We have been discussing about these different challenges and I see some solution coming out finally, which can address many of these challenges in more efficient way, and MWC is the right setting, I believe with so many mobile operators, ecosystem players out there, and with use cases like private networks coming out and on-demand connectivity.

Olivier: [00:17:20] It come together. I forgot, and my apology for that. And, but this is the point of those post Neil, I mean, private network is a, is a superior use case also. And this is highly promoted by, by my team. And, you know, access to private network is very often on demand. mean, can you can reside in the private network, but let's say, you know, if you, if you build a private network, people are in and out and what do you need to do?

So we, we see a lot try in term of technology using eSIM , using TMC. So, so some, some, some type of I would say weird technology or technology, which are two AV to get deployed and to be scaled for private network. Where the, the use case of technology of the CloudSIM™ technology for CloudSIM™ is tremendous because it, it facilitate the adoption, the integration of a device to to a private network.

So this is, yeah, and again, I, I'm happy you said that. You know I, I think all those innovation, all those things are coming. Because at the moment what we have is a bit too rigid, has not been, has not been designed to be flexible to to change. Too often we, we are not here to debate why we don't want, but we need consider that the world and the ecosystem we are operating it require this agility, this flexibility, this scalability.

And that's why at least we are bringing our stone to to the, to the foundation of this IoT house . And, and I think with this one, we are proposing something which is fundamentally different and which serve fundamental and critical points that are face, face by many stakeholder in the ecosystem today.

Neil: [00:19:13] Yeah, that's fantastic and look forward to visiting your booth and getting the demos firsthand. Talking more about it, the industry, it's super excited about this and thanks Oliver for being on this podcast and giving us your time. 

Olivier: [00:19:27] now Neil, always a pleasure of your listener. We'll have said something again. You know, we, we will be at Mobile Work Congress, and like you, we welcome everybody on our booth and data booth to, to do some, some demo automotive, non automotive with different use.

You know where to find us and we can organize podcast seminars and, and interaction with people interested. So always a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you!

Neil: [00:19:55] Thank you very much. And for our listeners, thanks for tuning in. If you have any questions or want more information, do reach out to us on our email contact@counterpointresearch.com

You can also listen to our previous podcast on major podcasting platforms, apple Podcast, Spotify podcast, and more for now. Neil Shah signing off. Have a good day and good evening. See you next time, and hopefully with some more interesting topics and innovations like these. Thank you very much!